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Then there is the person who says: "I have no time to look after those 

 things. I am too busy. I cannot stop to look after accounts and budgets." 



Recently I was talking with a very dear little woman I know, and she 

 said: "I don't like the way things are going in our house. My husband and 

 I are rather disturbed. We are able to pay our bills, but we are not getting 

 where we should with our income." I said to her: "Have you kept track 

 of the money that you spend?" "Oh, yes," she said, "I have." I found that 

 she had not learned to classify her figures although she had taken pains to 

 keep a record of everything. I thought I would try her out, so I said: 

 "Well, with your three children," (the oldest of whom was four) I should 

 think you would be a pretty busy woman to do this, She said: "I am too 

 busy not to do it." A pretty good answer for some of us, if we are too busy! 

 She had three children, had no help with the housework, did her sewing, 

 and yet she was too busy not to look after the household expenses. This 

 little woman has always given me great comfort. 



We can usually do the things we want to do. When we say we are too 

 busy, it is often because we want to excuse ourselves from doing something. 



Then, of course, there are a great many people who simply like to be 

 extravagant. They like to pay big prices for things. 



I overheard a very interesting conversation between three or four young 

 men not very long ago. They were sitting just opposite me on the train, 

 and it appeared from the conversation that they had been exchanging 

 neckties, and each one had gotten the tie that he preferred out of the group. 

 Finally one of the boys asked another: "Say, what did you pay for this 

 necktie?" When found that the boy had paid less for the necktie than he 

 had paid for his, he did not like it and wanted to trade back. That is a 

 good' illustration. It was nothing in the world but the cost. The tie was 

 very nice until he knew how much it cost, or that it had cost less money than 

 his own, then he did not like it very well. 



You know, we are all very much alike. Let's admit it, and let's try to 

 overcome that fault in ourselves, because we do have it. 



There are the people who think that they are unfortunate because they 

 haven't the means to keep up with the neighbors. I suppose we are all 

 influenced by that to a greater extent than we appreciate, perhaps, but that 

 is a very unfortunate attitude toward the income. 



Now, as a matter of fact, what should be our attitude? Where should 

 we stand on this matter of the income? One safe and sensible thing is to 

 realize that incomes are different, therefore our spending our saving and' our 

 giving should be different. 



To the best of our ability, our incomes should express our best judgment 

 as to the thing that is worth while, the thing that will mean the most to us. 



ACCOUNTS ARE NECESSARY. 



Now, I am going to say something that I always hesitate to say when I 

 am talking to people, because there are so many people who don't want to 

 hear me say it. You will have to keep accounts. There is no other way. 

 Could a business ever run without accounts? Can a household run without 

 accounts? Well, not run well. The business of the household is not being 

 taken care of if we haven't some sort of an account. It does not follow that 

 we need an elaborate system of bookkeeping, but we must have something 

 in black and white. There must be some accounts. 



I know people who keep accounts, and who have kept accounts, and who 

 have balanced thier accounts to a penny. These people are very painstaking 

 and' put down everything, and they have pages upon pages of figures over a 

 number of years, yet these accounts are not worth a snap of the finger be- 

 cause they have never been classified. The expenditures have never been 

 grouped and so the account does not mean a thing. Unless we can group 

 together like expenditures so that we can get some idea of what we have 

 been spending and what the relation of that is to the income as a whole, we 

 have no means of knowing whether we approve of what we have done or not. 



